Podcasting: social and multidirectional?

Micropersuasion's Steve Rebel recently published a post about the qualifications of podcasting as a social medium.

Podcasting today, is undeniably a less social medium than blogging is, but that does not mean that podcasting lacks the ability to surpass blogging’s ability to perform as a social medium. Podcasting certainly lacks the ease of use that has brought blogging as far as it has come, but boats many advantages that blogging lacks. Blogging is far less of a mobile media, and for lacks the ability to communicate with audio and video.

Far more can be communicated through one’s voice and facial expressions than may ever be communicated through a keyboard.

"No medium is inherently social. Each medium that gets utilized is as social as the creator wants it to be."- Rob Safuto

I think that as time goes by, podcasters will begin to make their content more and more community driven. Blogging communities certainly did not exist at the birth of the medium, but grew as blogging did.

Blogs, podcasts, wikis, etc are simply places where it is possible for people to gather and talk about similar topics and create digital communities. Just because a blog exists, does it automatically make it a social medium? No. Granted the current state of podcasting is far less social than blogging is today, but the advantages that podcasting has over blogging gives it some pretty big opportunities for growth.